It’s a d*am shame. (Just a rant about STPP and whatnot)

The United States will criminalize itself off a cliff at the pace it is working to institutionalize this nation’s youth. It makes no sense that over 10 million youth are rotting away in this nation’s jails and prisons when half of them do petty crimes that can be addressed with conflict mediation or restorative justice. It is unfathomable that such depravity can exist, especially when it is wrapped in context with racism and classism. How is it that this nation has 5 times as many youth in prisons and jails than any other country? How is that justice? How is that beneficial in any capacity? It is a travesty and a grave violation of ethics and morality…that is what it is.

The part that pisses me off to the core though is that somehow we have allowed this rigid line of ideology to somehow come and punish creativity and curiosity. How is it that a country that consistently complains about not having enough capable or wanting minds for STEM, see no issue with punishing the very children who have some inclination toward it. I do not for the life of me understand it….it is as if we are speaking in double rhetoric just to hear ourselves. How is it that a country that prides itself on freedom and justice can somehow come up with a half-a**ed excuse for putting children who have never violated any type of law in prison as a felons? How? You’d think that if we can waste over 3 billion dollars on standardized assessment and corporate reform agenda that we could at minimum half-a**ed do the job for incarceration prevention for youth, or that we could at least do a half a**ed job in investing in the thing that makes the world go around…creativity. But nope, it’s easier just to lock all the kids away, especially the Black and Brown ones.

This incarceration of youth thing…it’s an area of expertise for the State of Florida though, it’s something “they” (the powers that be within the states justice system) enjoy making happen though. It makes no sense that Florida can rank 2nd in incarcerating Black and Hispanic youths….yet, it is occurring. 1,294,212…that’s excessive…too d@mn many…way too many. (Texas enjoys it more than any other state if we are going to be fair here.) This should not even be an issue today…we should be investing in the education of children instead of the incarceration of children. I do not see how we as a nation of stakeholders can have priorities so backward and conscious so weak.

It just makes no sense though…this country continually criminalizes and punishes youth, steals their education, returns it with a “beta” mode of “public” education and then resorts to calling them lazy entitled bums. How in the h*ll does that work?